'Not a nice situation' - Grosjean

Romain Grosjean admits Lotus goes to Melbourne with more problems than solutions after ending pre-season without completing a race simulation.

Grosjean ended his Sunday test after just 30 laps following engine troubles, bringing to a close a hugely frustrating pre-season for Lotus. Despite Renault's problems being well known, Grosjean admits Lotus has issues of their own to consider as well.

"We did as much as we could from the little amount of running we had," he said. "Every time we stopped we tried to improve. There are things which went in the right direction which is quite nice. It is even more complicated than everyone thought with this power unit. There's a lot of work on our side and a lot of work on the Renault side still to do."

Lotus heads to Melbourne with the most limited mileage and Grosjean admits their first attempt at completing a race distance will be when the lights go out at Albert Park.

"We can do some starts [in Australia practice], we can do some things with fuel, but we are not going to do race simulation until the race itself," he said. "So there will be a lot of things to do, and it won't be nice to change all the buttons on the steering wheel and everything. But this is the situation we are facing so all we can do is do it as good as we can and discover what it is like to race 300km with 100 kilos of fuel."

Grosjean insists he is trying to stay optimistic at slightly improved fortunes of other Renault-powered teams in the second Bahrain test.

"We are not in a nice situation but it does not mean we cannot recover. There are a thousand things I'm trying to solve on my car and with my mapping. We need to have good discussions with Renault to see how best we can work well together."